Who homebrews?

[jwb96]

Got a TrueBrew kit for Xmas and am planning to have some fun. As soon as I figure out what I'm doing. Any tips for beginners? Trying to figure out what my first batch should be. Would love to do a Belgian dubble or a wheat beer, not sure if that's a good place to start. Will be hitting the local homebrew shop for suggestions, but am pretty sure I've seen people here mention homebrewing. And since good taste is often common between both bikes and beers, figured it was worth a try asking here.

Thanks,
Jim

PS: favorites I'd like to aspire to include anything Ommegang, anything Trappist, Paulaner or Franziskaner H-W, Bel Haven, Black Fly & Mt Cadillac Stouts, and too many more to mention.

[DarrenCT]

cool xmas gift for sure

no clue about homebrewing but im sure it would be lotsa fun

good luck and send me a sample

d

[quaintjh]

is the place to start. Its not too temp dependent and will yield very good results. For a starter kit type (extract rather than mashing) try

williamsbrewing.com

they will have what ales you!

Jay

[Dekonick]

best tips -
Clean - clean - clean.

use liquid yeast if possible - it makes the biggest improvement relative to effort and cost.

Leaf hop plugs are better than pellets.

Top fermenting beers are easier for new brewers.

Get the book - The Joy of Homebrewing

Relax! and drink a beer while you brew.

[Tom]

Start with something simple like a brown ale. Too subtle or too big should wait for a brew or two until you get your feet underneath you.

If you find a source of the 16-oz swingtop bottles, grab them and run, don't look back.

No need to sterilize, but you better sanitize or it'll taste like rancid snot. Spend the bucks on iodophor, bleach works great but you have to rinse and rinse unless you really like the taste of bleach.

Use extracts and make grain tea if you want to work the flavors. It'll save a lot of time, come out nearly as good as all grain mashing but doesn't require the combo chemical engineering/microbiology degree.

Use as big a boil pot as you can get. If you stick with it, get yourself a grill ring like the ones they sell with the turkey frying kit, about an eight gallon pot for a five gallon batch and do it in the driveway.

Boilovers are good in the driveway, but they really suck in the kitchen. "But honey, I'm krausening!" just doesn't fly indoors. And it will boil over unless you watch it constantly until the hot break. Turn your back for five seconds and it's three hours of cleanup.

[Dekonick]

If you have to boil indoors, keep a spray bottle of COLD water to spritz on your wert to prevent boilover. It WILL boil over if you don't keep a close watch.

Enjoy!

[DarrenCT]

can you brew really really strong beers with these homebrew kits!??

[AgilisMerlin]

yes, you can have pretty heady,high alc. content, brewing your own beer....

only recommendation i have for someone starting out....


clean clean clean, as mentioned above.

and when you pitch the yeast.............make damn sure the wort is not too hot.......

that is about it..

pretty simple procedure

[Tom]

Originally Posted by DarrenCT

can you brew really really strong beers with these homebrew kits!??

Absolutely, assuming that by 'strong' you mean a relatively high alcohol content. I brew an Imperial Stout that, in a five gallon batch, has 12 pounds of malt extract, a jar of molasses and about seven pounds of steeped grain. Even though I'm just steeping the grain, you can't help but extract some sugars. The yield is low but it is there. You can use either a stout yeast, a scottish ale yeast or champagne yeast in a high gravity beer.

I don't have the numbers in front of me but the alcohol content is somewhere above 11%, but that's like talking about one bike measure in isolation. This particular ale has an incredibly large amount of hops to go along with the large amount of dark grains so even though one glass knocks you on your rear, it has a balanced and complex flavor. It's best if you bottle it in at least a 16oz bottle and leave it for a year before opening.

[gt6267a]

practice your procedures before you actually do anything. i.e. fill things up with water and move the water through whatever containers you plan to use from wort to bottle. sans beer it only take 10-20 mins but you'll see the path and learn the little tricks with water not the good stuff.

for example, a lesson you'll learn by doing ... how do you transfer fermented beer from one container to another for bottling or removing from sediment without touching anything and potentially contaminating the batch? probably a siphon ... how do you prime the siphon? probably with your mouth ... now you have to sanitize the end of the siphon before transfering the beer. how do you do that? probably by sticking both ends of the primed siphon in idophur ... how do you take the siphon out of the idophur without the priming liquid running out? probably by pinching the siphon. how do you pinch the siphon reasonably? probably by putting a little clip on it ...

nothing is complicated, but i recommend 'screwing up' with water instead of beer...

as said above ... be sanitary ... that will be your biggest battle in the first few batches

and of course, relax and have a homebrew!

[Tom]

Originally Posted by gt6267a

... how do you prime the siphon? probably with your mouth ... !

No. Never. Before you put the siphon hose on the racking cane, simply fill the hose with water at the tap, just don't touch the faucet with the hose. City water's sanitary enough. Actually, some would argue that you let your city brew water sit overnight to let the chlorine evaporate if you're using it to mash or top up your fermenter. I don't bother, but then I'm not entering it into contests.

[J.Greene]

A buddy and i brewed quite a bit 12-13 years ago. Start small and add more features with every batch. The brew store will be overwelming and you'll be tempted to go crazy quick. One tip that was given to us was to use 2 litre soda bottles rather than all glass bottles. They worked great and when we drank a few it was easier than having a bunch of bottles to reclean and cap again.

and of course be very clean.

JG

[gt6267a]

Originally Posted by Tom

No. Never. Before you put the siphon hose on the racking cane, simply fill the hose with water at the tap, just don't touch the faucet with the hose. City water's sanitary enough. Actually, some would argue that you let your city brew water sit overnight to let the chlorine evaporate if you're using it to mash or top up your fermenter. I don't bother, but then I'm not entering it into contests.

i think our procedures were different ... we left the siphon hose / racking cane setup alone and never took it apart. we always made sure to prime the siphon / racking cane with idophured or chlorinated water and then leave both ends of the racking cane / siphon setup in the sanitizing water for at least 15mins. that way we sanitized the siphon inside and out. even if you consider the tap water clean, there is not enough chlorine in it to sanitize anything.

we were probably a little over-zealous with the cleaning, but we were very careful with our beer-side surfaces ... anything touching beer was sanitized, and that includes boiling rinse water for carboys, kegs, and bottles.

we were all-grain brewers and spent a LOT of time tasting grains and pondering their impact on our beers. even a small infection will seriously impact the flavor of beer. i think this is massively undervalued by most home brewers.

from time to time, a friend hands me a home brew and i try it. it is pretty rare that i don't taste an infection. i mention this and am told that is the flavor of home brew since they have it in every batch. argh ...

[cak]

About cleanliness. Clean and rinse. Everything. Get a turkey fryer and do it outside. You can usually find them on sale this time of year. Use buckets for fermenting. Much safer than glass.
Get Jon Palmer's How to Brew
And let me encourage you to try all grain brewing pretty soon after you start. That is if you decide you like homebrewing. It is REALLY easy, not expensive and makes a HUGE differance in the quality, clarity and taste of the beer. It only adds about 1.5 hours to the brewday once you have your procedures down and cuts costs down a bit as well.
Some good resources
www.hbd.org
www.brewboard.com
www.howtobrew.com

And most of all, HAVE FUN!!

Andrew

[Ozz]

Originally Posted by Dekonick

best tips -
Clean - clean - clean.....

+1000

It's fun.....it does make the whole house smell like beer when you boil the wort though. I hope you have an understanding wife.

When you get into it, here is a good book: "The Complete Joy of Homebrewing"